Clinicopathologic characteristics and prognosis of gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms: a multicenter study in South China

Background: Gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms(GEP-NENs) are a heterogeneous group of rare tumors. Many issues in terms of epidemiologic features, pathogenesis, and treatment of GEP-NENs are still under discussion. Our study aimed to analyze the clinicopathologic characteristics and prognosis of Chinese patients with GEP-NENs.Methods: Complete clinicopathologic data and survival information of 1183 patients with GEP-NENs treated between 2005 and 2015 were collected from five medical centers in Guangdong Province, China. Patient survival was estimated using the Kaplan–Meier method and analyzed using the log-rank test; prognostic factors were analyzed using the Cox proportional hazards model.Results: The most common tumor location was the rectum(37.4%), followed by the pancreas(28.1%), stomach(20.7%), small intestine(7.2%), appendix(3.4%), and colon(3.3%). After initial definitive diagnosis, 1016(85.9%) patients underwent surgery. The 1-, 3-, and 5-year overall survival(OS) rates for the entire cohort were 87.9%, 78.5%, and 72.8%, respectively. The 3-year OS rates of patients with G1, G2, and G3 tumors were 93.1%, 82.7%, and 43.1%, respectively(P < 0.001). The 3-year OS rates of patients with stage I, II, III, and IV tumors were 96.0%, 87.3%, 64.0%, and 46.8%, respectively(P < 0.001). Patients with distant metastasis who underwent palliative surgery had a longer survival than those who did not(P = 0.003). Similar survival benefits of palliative surgery were observed in patients with neuroendocrine tumor(P y, M category, and sur= 0.031) or neuroendocrine carcinoma(P gery were found to be independent prog= 0.046). In multivariate analysis, age, grade, N categornostic factors.Conclusions: Patients with GEP-NENs who are women, younger than 50 years old, have smaller tumor size, have lower tumor grade, have lower T/N/M category, and who undergo surgery can have potentially longer survival time. Our data showed that surgery can improve the prognosis of GEP-NEN patients with distant metastasis. However, randomized controlled trials need to be conducted to establish the optimal criteria for selecting patients to undergo surgery.

Boosting Li-ion storage in Li2MnO_(3) by unequal-valent Ti4+-substitution and interlayer Li vacancies building

Lithium rich layered oxide(LRLO) has been considered as one of the promising cathodes for lithium-ion batteries(LIBs). The high voltage and large capacity of LRLO depend on Li2MnO_(3)phase. To ameliorate the electrochemical performance of Li2MnO_(3), also written as Li(Li1/3Mn2/3)O_(2), we propose a strategy to substitute Mn4+and Li+in Mn/Li transition metal layer with Ti4+, which can stabilize the structure of Li2MnO_(3)by inhibiting the excessive oxidation of O_(2)-above 4.5 V. More significantly, the unequal-valent substitution brings about the emergence of interlayer Li vacancies, which can promote the Li-ion diffusion based on the enlarged interlayer and increase the capacity by activating the Mn3+/4+redox. We designed Li0.7[Li1/3Mn2/3]0.7Ti0.3O_(2)with high interlayer Li vacancies, which presents a high capacity(290 m Ah/g at 10 m A/g) and stable cycling performance(84% over 60 cycles at 50 m A/g). We predict that this strategy will be helpful to further improve the electrochemical performance of LRLOs.

The mechanisms of colorectal cancer cell mesenchymal-epithelial transition induced by hepatocyte exosome-derived miR-203a-3p

Phosphatase of regenerating liver 3(PRL3)promotes colorectal cancer(CRC)metastasis by inducing epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition.Mesenchymal-to-epithelial transition(MET),the opposite of epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition,has been proposed as a mechanism for the establishment of metastatic neoplasms.However,the molecular mechanism of MET remains unclear.Here,we show that miR-203a-3p derived from hepatocyte exosomes inhibits Src expression,reduces epidermal growth factor receptor activity and downstream signaling pathways,and increases E-cadherin expression,which is a typical mesenchymal cell marker of MET,in CRC cells.These results show the important role of epidermal growth factor receptor in CRC cell MET.